


Futures Freak Me Out

by hidinginplainsight (hidinginplain_sight)



Category: Neon Genesis Evangelion
Genre: Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Long-Term Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-14
Updated: 2017-04-14
Packaged: 2018-10-18 21:34:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 18,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10625574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hidinginplain_sight/pseuds/hidinginplainsight
Summary: Shinji and Asuka are college roommates, but will their fear of the potential consequences of a relationship stop them from taking the one chance they both so desperately want to take?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a repost of a work I made on Fanfiction.net from May 6 2015-Nov 23 2016. I was going through a lot of bad things when I wrote this (hence why it took over a year to write a not-that-long fanfic), and I think this fanfic helped me work through it to be completely honest. 
> 
> It was always one of my favorites, anyway. I hope you guys enjoy it.

 "Though we feel let down  
By the same old autumn breathing  
Winter's curse is just around the bend."  
\- The Motion City Soundtrack

* * *

There's a party inside the bar, but we're out in the alley, squaring off like we're about to have a fist fight. Her cold blue eyes are boring into mine and her jaw is clenched like a bear trap. I can see her weighing her words, which isn't a common thing for Asuka to do. This must be important.

She looks off to the side, and ashes her cigarette on the ground next to her. She lifts it up to her lips and is about to take another drag when she begins to speak instead.

"You know I'm not someone who… talks about these things a lot. I don't have a battle plan for this. It might be sloppy." She shakes her head and lets the flame drop out of her hands. She crushes it underneath her foot and fixes me in her gaze again.

"I like… this. I like _us_. I like what we've found here," she gestures around. "Things have been rough lately, you know that. Jesus Christ you're pretty much the only person I can talk to about it. Those assholes in there are just…" she trails off looking for words.

"Friends?" I offer. She snorts.

"Barely. _Some_ maybe." She takes out another cigarette and moves to light it.

"Asuk-"

"Fuck off, Ikari. They're my lungs, I can do what I want with 'em." She inhales again, and dies a little more.

I had a conversation with Asuka when she started smoking, about how it worried me and the like, but there was no convincing her. Once the Eva battles ended, Asuka took it the worst. It was her identity, and sure we'd saved the world, but she'd rendered herself victoriously obsolete. Honestly, all things considered, she could be doing much worse things to her body than smoking. Heroin, I guess. Any number of other stupid things.

It's not like I could stop her.

_A memory_ :

"I'll die from this," she said, holding a pack up of red Gauloises for me to see. "I know you probably don't understand, but I like knowing that."

"Why?" I had asked.

Click. Light. Drag. "Because it's my choice."

_Now_ :

"But they're not real friends, Shinji. None of them lived through what we did. No one understands, really. I don't… I don't know if they _could_." She studies the ground. The crushed tobacco under her feet.

Inside the bar, someone spills something and there's a massive uproar of laughter. It might be a fight, I can't really tell.

I sigh, "Look, if you don't want me here-"

"That's not what I'm saying, just… let me talk, for a second." She's groping for words again. Saying what she feels is rarely a problem with the Teutonic fury in front of me, but she's using the German part of her brain. She's picking words like clockwork, making sure they're in their places before unleashing them.

'You have to think like that, with German,' she told me once. 'It's harder to be stream of consciousness. English and Japanese flow more like water, but with German each word is a cog, and if you miss one, the whole meaning falls apart.' It had something to do with the way the sentences were made and verb conjugation. I didn't really understand it at the time, but the older and less impulsive Asuka's gotten the more I've seen that German side come out in her.

She lines her cogs up and speaks:

"I need you, Shinji." My first name drops like an atomic bomb. No honorific after it emasculating me, and not the more common 'Ikari'. I don't remember the last time I was just 'Shinji'.

She continues: "I need you to be near me and to help me with this mess."

"You mean the thing with your father?"

"Yes! That, college, these people, all of it. Nobody gets me like you do. You've seen me at rock bottom and you're still here and I need that… probably more than I even know I do," she smiles ruefully. "I'm too smart to think I always know exactly what's going on in my head, so."

"So what?"

"So problem is this," she holds up a finger. "We know what we are as friends. We're closer than we've ever been, and yes," I think she's blushing, but it's hard to see in the lower light. "On some level I'm certainly..." she mumbles something, but in the din I can't hear it. _She lacks tape reviews?_

"…on some level you're _what_?"

"Oh come on!" She tosses up her hands, sending ash everywhere. I watch her turn towards the brick wall behind herself and gently tap her head against it.

"I couldn't hear, Asuka! The bar is-"

"I'm _attracted_ to you, okay?! I like you! I find you attractive! Jesus, Ikari, what are you, _stupid_?!" She's certainly blushing now, and I feel my face heat up as well. "Why do you think we spend so much time together?! Why do you think I choose you to study with?! We're rooming together for Christ's sake, do you think it's because you're such a good cook?! I can order food if I need it, it's your company I _want_!" Asuka stands, hands at her sides, face red from screaming. She looks away, deeply embarrassed. I think she said more than she meant to.

"You just wanted to hear me say it twice, you perv." She mutters to herself, barely audible from where I'm standing. I can't help but smile at it.

I look down at the ground, shoving my hands in my pockets. Unbidden, I think of the first time we kissed, all those eons ago.

"Asuka, I… I like you too, you know?"

"Yeah," she says, quietly turning a deeper shade of red. "Yeah, I know."

I shift my weight and I force myself to look back up at her face.

"Well, maybe we could give it a shot then?" I say, trying to keep excitement out of my voice. She leans against the bricks with a sigh.

"We really shouldn't."

"Why not?" I spread my arms, "If we both want to, then why would we ever not? What's holding us back?!"

"Because what happens if it doesn't work, huh?!" She there's fire in her eyes, and all of a sudden I'm fourteen again and falling in love with a girl who hates me. "It _changes_ things, Shinji! And I don't want them to change… I can't have them change, not when we've finally found what we're supposed to always have been."

"Which is what?"

"This! Us! Talking! Saying things we actually mean and not some passive-aggressive fourteen-year-old bullshit!" She's screaming now. I'm happy for the ruckus of the bar, for once. "People in relationships lie! They end up wanting things that aren't there, and they get bored and they fuck other people, and I'm not gonna have that happen, Ikari! Not to you and not to me!"

She looks away, relighting her nearly forgotten cigarette. Inside, I see Touji waving to see if everything's okay, and I wave him an 'okay' as convincingly as possible. No one needs to know this is happening. The last thing I want right now is an audience.

"So what," I ask, throat dry. "we're not even going to try?"

"No, we're not." There's a note of finality in her voice that crushes something inside of me.

"That's… pretty damn cynical, Asuka." She laughs.

"Yeah, well. You're the one attracted to it." Her eyes are mocking. She's shoving me away again, trying to kill the mood as much as possible, and I hate her for it. You self-destructive jerk. Cigarettes and booze and crushing your own happiness before it starts. Something boils up inside me.

"You're pathetic, you know that?"

Anger flares in her eyes, and she tosses her cigarette at my face. It flies over my shoulder harmlessly, but I felt the heat as it traveled past my ear.

"Get off it, Ikari. I bet you just wanted to fuck."

She starts to head back towards the bar.

"Oh, so did you," I mutter, and for a moment, she stops in her tracks. Her back is to me, the doorknob is in her hands, and she's standing there like a statue.

I think she's trying to come up with a retort – a final word she can snap back and 'win' the conversation with – but she's too busy thinking again. Finally she looks at me, and she's smiling again, but it's a sad smile this time. There's regret everywhere in it.

"Oh come on, Shinji," another atom bomb, straight to my heart. "I think we both know that's not true."

And then I realize she's thought about it as much as I have. She's stayed up at night and wondered how it would feel to consummate our friendship, if it would be angry, or cathartic, or even… sweet? Would we 'make love'? She's wondered how I taste, as I have with her. She's said those three words to herself with my name at the end, just to try them out.

Suddenly I'm not angry anymore, and neither is she.

Asuka steps forward, and takes me in an embrace. She nuzzles into my chest and squeezes a little too tight. It almost feels desperate.

I kiss the top of her head, long bereft of sync clips, and I breathe in her scent. It's a little smoky now, but I love it. I've come to associate the smell with her, which frightens me a little. We're both changing, and there's nothing we can do about it except hold on.

"We would be a great couple, Asuka." I mention, feeling her against me: the tight grip of her arms and the gentle push of her breasts into my torso. Even through her coat I feel her warmth like fire.

She leans back and looks up. "You know, we probably could," she giggles. Asuka giggling. What a night of firsts this has been. I place my hand around her waist.

"But we won't?"

She shakes her head decisively.

"Not a chance, Baka-Shinji," and for once, it sounds like a pet name instead of an insult. It sounds like something a lover would call me.

"So what are we then?"

"We're us. Like we always have been," she's smiling now, her fingers lace through mine and lead me towards the doorway. "Because you know what happens to couples that will never happen to us?"

"No, what?"

"They end."

* * *


	2. Chapter 2

"But all I can do is close my eyes,  
And cross my heart,  
And hope to die."  
\- The Motion City Soundtrack

* * *

I'm six beers in when I realize I'll be waking up with a hangover, but I'm already reaching for the seventh.

I'm trying to hydrate, you know? I've been chugging water in between the ubiquitous booze, but there's only so much a liver can handle before it sends it straight to your head. I already bashed my shin in on something earlier, and I think it might be bleeding again. Alcohol lowers the coagulation in your blood, right?

Right. That's a thing. Anemia and Mephistopheles and a million other things that I've blessedly forgotten. A moment of quiet, all to myself, brought to me by Sapporo. I crave quiet. I overthink things too much. I've been trying to stop, but everytime I do I just get caught in another rabbit hole. Bad decisions leading to bad ends, with no way out. At least when I was piloting I had a purpose. Now I'm just getting drunk alone in my apartment, because I know Shinji won't be home until late. There's a pleasant warmth that comes from a buzz. It feels like being in someone's arms, even when you're throwing up in the gutter.

I stumble onto the porch of our apartment and drop my cigarettes before I can light one. I laugh at my clumsiness, and pick them up to light up and feel the rush of nicotine into my blood. Drinking always makes me want to smoke. It also makes smoking feel better, so go figure. I'm no fucking fool.

I have to import these goddamn things. Japanese cigarettes just make me want to vomit, they're so thick with cheap tobacco. Don't even get me started on the fucking Chinese ones. And sure, Gauloises are _French_ , but they're all over Germany. I remember walking into my first shop in Frankfurt and throwing my head back, proud:

"Die Gauloises, bitte."

"Ja, natürlich. Rot oder blau?"

Like she had to ask. My first pack had damn well better be my color.

I inhale again and I think of momma, before I'd ever even heard what an Evangelion was. Early Germany. Holding her hand in the street and marveling at the Schloss towering above us in Heidelberg. Flowers and buildings so old that I can't even fathom the first stone being laid down. Knights walked along these streets.

The oldest city in Tokyo-3 probably dates to the mid-1990s. I'm almost certainly older than this porch I'm standing on. How old am I again?

Twenty... twenty-one now. Yeah, I'm twenty-one, right? Jesus, I'm drunk.

Beer eight happens somewhere around here. I fumble with the bottle opener, and it spills a little on the counter, but I don't mind. I'll clean it up later. Back to the porch. Another cig.

More and more smoking just made sense. We're all dying anyway, right? It's not like by _not_ smoking you _won't_ die. I'm no hedonist, but it feels good and, like the booze, I think clearer with it. Sure, I scramble for my pack after movies or an exam, but if you're not self-destructive on some level, and you're not a fucking liar, then I don't really know what to say to you. 'Open your eyes', maybe. Open them up wide and see the madness of this existence for what it is: a story without a moral or an author. I think we invented stories to help us make sense of the fact that there is inherently very little in this place we live.

I've been playing with the idea of going back to Europe for good. I don't know if there's anything left for me in this city. It's just bad memories. I walk down the avenue and remember a giant spider dribbling acid down my back. I could taste it in my mouth for a moment. I see a car accident and just remember how they felt when they crunched under my feet. Little bits of glass and rebar. The power of Japanese engineering.

I could go _study_ in Heidelberg. There's an old college there – one of the first in Europe I think – and it's just beautiful. It's in a mountain pass, with green rising up around every side. It's a valley for sure, but it feels as if there are arms around you, just holding you tight. Like momma used to hold me.

Or booze. Maybe Heidelberg just feels like binge drinking?

Inhale again. Drink again. My body is a biological shit show right now, I'm sure.

For the millionth time, I wonder what's keeping me in this godforsaken place, but I already know the answer to that question.

It's not like he speaks German. It's not like he'd follow me.

Also, wouldn't that be admitting it? Admitting even more explicitly than words. Hell, he probably _would_ follow me, but how could I let him? He's got a life here. I won't let him start back at square one just because of my selfishness.

I lean against the balcony and let the wind blow across my face. I'm sweating a little, even though it's a chilly night. Alcohol and cigarettes will do that to you. My internal temperature should be about thirty-eigh-

Oh shit.

Fumbling the bottle, I watch it cascade out of my hands, half-full, and explode on the ground below. I hide for a moment out of childish instinct, and then slowly raise myself back up to look at the damage I caused. The bottle is in a million pieces, just like the cars used to be under my feet. It didn't hit anyone, which is good, but there are a couple of pissed off people who are looking angrily up at me. I laugh at them, four stories above their ire.

"Run for your lives!" I yell down, giggling. "This neighborhood is unsafe! There's a crazy person out!"

I laugh at my own joke, collapsing back onto the porch. Someone yells something inflammatory back up at me, but honestly I could _give_ a fuck. I saved your life, asshole. You and your daughter and your mother and your father and that girl you jerked off to in high school. All of their lives depend on me and how good I am at saving them. You should be thanking your lucky stars you had the privilege of meeting me, regardless of how shitfaced I am.

I am Asuka Langley Sohryu. I save the world every day. That's on me.

Well, not anymore. Now all that's 'on me' is me.

I frown.

After several moments of fumbling, I realize the cigarettes went over the balcony with the bottle. And that's unfortunate.

I think there's another pack in my bedroom.

It takes both hands to haul myself up and back into the apartment. Everything spins in our living room, where Shinji keeps his cello and all of our movies are. Pacific Rim catches my eye and my memory pulls the movie out for me to see again. It actually wasn't terrible considering how much of Nerv was classified at the time. Hilariously inaccurate, but that wasn't their fault. Happy ending, monsters dead, cute Japanese girl forehead touch.

I snicker. "You idiot," I say to Guillermo del Toro, "there are no happy endings."

But really what I mean is that there are usually no endings at all. Life doesn't end until it _ends_ , and there certainly aren't credits after it. There aren't sequels if it grosses over $500 million.

I hate bad endings, and every ending is bad.

Which is why I'm still single, even when I feel his hand on my back longer than it should be. Or when I leave the door unlocked when I shower, just in case. Or how I pay more attention to our legs touching when we're on the couch than I do whatever it is we're watching. Or how I should practically name my vibrator after him at this point. He wouldn't have three power settings, though, he would know exactly when and how to-

Oh, look, there's the pack. I grab it and head back to the porch.

I trip and fall onto it, only barely catching myself on the table. I chuckle. "Guten Tag, Herr Veranda. Wie gehts? Alles gut bei dir?"

_Ja, alles gut._

"Ah, fantastisch! Toll. Ich auch."

Licht für die Zigarette.

_Aber du bist getrunken, jetzt?_

"Ja, genau, und es ist das beste."

Oh, it is. There's no big bad world here. There's no more Evas or Angels or sync tests. Hell, I technically have _homework_ to do, which is a weird concept when you've watched people die. Right now, I can boil the earth down to just me and this porch.

Well, not just.

Unbidden, I remember some awful German pop song from near when I was born. It just pops into my head, even though I really didn't want it to. It's some slow love song mama used to like. I think that's where I heard it first. All I know is that before I can even control it, I'm singing it. It's weird how you remember lyrics to songs only when they come out of you.

My voice cracks and my words slur. I'm no pop idol, but I know every note.

" _Du bist das beste was mir je passiert ist_  
Es tut so gut, wie du mich liebst  
Vergess' den Rest der Welt,  
Wenn do bei mir bist…"

It's the chorus, and I sing it again, louder. I'm practically shouting it off the balcony at this point. I might be getting cops called on me tonight, but the world needs to know this song. They need to know -

I feel the tears on my face before I was even aware they were happening. Wh-what? Why am I…? I wipe them away angrily, but they won't stop coming. Collapsing to my knees, I cover my mouth and just decide to let it go. It's not like anyone's here to see.

Jesus, that's embarrassing. That's a fucking awful song, it's what old women listen to. Why is this garbage hitting my heart like this?

Pop songs are engineered to literally be accessible to anyone, which is why they're lyrically so bland and vague, but every once in a while one of those damn songs lines up with your life and then, well, you're me. On my balcony, drunk as hell, crying my eyes out.

I just… can't.

I can't leave him here. There's no one to go back to in Germany, there's nothing for me there but more dead livers and diseased lungs. We could talk online, but it's not like that would be the same. It's not like he'd be there to ask me how my day was when I got home. I'd never hear that cello wake me up in the morning. We'd never have nights where he cooks and I clean, which is annoying at first, but then it becomes a ritual and then he has to clean them again because you're so bad at it…

Oh hell.

I really can't do this. I can't keep falling in love with him. I have to get out of this apartment and this city before I do something I regret. That we both regret.

But that would be an end of sorts, wouldn't it? Hypothetically the friendship would live on, but it would be electronic. Strained and truncated across wifi and phone lines. It would hardly be a friendship at all, would it? Not the one I want, anyway.

Maybe here is the best? Maybe it would be… nice, to be a couple? To hold hands and kiss like people actually do. Maybe we could make it work?

Maybe Shinji is rig-

Oh shit, I'm gonna throw up. Yeah, I'm throwing up now.

I manage to stumble to the bathroom before I do, and at least that is a mercy. That and Shinji's late class. I'd hate for him to have seen me like this. I was a god once, and now I'm holding my hair behind my head so I don't have to take a shower after.

It doesn't really work, and I do have to shower it off. It'll be good to get the stink of beer off me as well.

Throwing on a shirt and panties, I'm still drunk enough to not notice I'm falling asleep in Shinji's bed. I can smell him on the pillow.

_Shinji… my Baka-Shinji…_

When I wake up in his arms, I don't even notice the hangover. It's warm here. It's so warm, and it feels like something that should have been happening forever. I feel his soft breathing whisper against my hair and I'm too afraid to turn around. I can't wake him up, I don't want to talk right now. I wouldn't know what to say, anyway.

I have to stay here. I have to go back to Germany. I… I don't know what I have to do.

All I know is that I want this. I want this every night and that want is growing stronger daily. I fight off drifting to sleep again. I want to remember this.

I stay as still as I can and let him hold me until I start feeling him stir, when I run away.

We don't talk about it at breakfast, and we probably never will.


	3. Chapter 3

"Do you look into the mirror to remind yourself you're there,  
Or have somebody's goodnight kisses got that covered?  
When I'm not being honest  
I pretend that you were just some lover."  
\- The Arctic Monkeys

* * *

Days turn into endless numbered days and before I know it, I realize what's bothering me. Stupid really. I should have seen it coming, but it's her hand on his arm. It's her smile when he shuffles through his unorganized notes. It's the transparence of all her flirty-flirty giggles and fucking obnoxious brown eyes.

It's all of it just rolled together into the shitheap that is 'Hitomi', and she sits next to Shinji in our elective lecture class.

I'm puffing away outside after the lesson, when she steps up to me with a bright smile on her face, all innocence and smiles and "I'm-just-too-damn-precious-to-know-sadness". Get off it, girlie. I'm onto your sexy schoolgirl act.

"Sohryu?" she chirps, clutching her binder to her chest. It's not a bad chest, either. She makes sure to accentuate that with her pushup bras and tight sweaters. I'm sure Shinji's noticed.

I take a drag and blow some smoke into the air, surreptitiously aiming it at her face.

Bullseye. Still got it.

"Yeah, what's up?" She makes a show of coughing before continuing.

"I was just wondering… you're roommates with Ikari, right?"

Is she trying to be funny?

"…yes."

Hitomi shuffles her feet before continuing.

"Well, he invited me over for dinner tonight, and I was wondering if I should, like, bring anything?"

Her voice makes the statement end in a question, even though I think it's actually some kind of challenge. She's asking permission from me, and I'm sure she's aware of that. She smiles sweetly, but I see the teeth behind it.

I toss my cigarette onto the ground and start to walk away before calling back.

"Vodka, rum, or beer. If it tastes expensive he'll be into it. He's quite a drinker, that one."

* * *

Running out of cigarettes when you need one is a pain like no other, so I'm giving in and at a shop buying some. The Marlboros, I guess. It doesn't matter at this point. Honestly, I might have just needed some air. Some alone time, away from Miss Flirty Full C-Cup and the asshole who is my roommate.

Walking home, I hear the scene before I see it. Two policemen, standing over a homeless man in an alleyway. One is shaking his shoulder, and the other is interviewing witnesses.

"Did he say anything before he collapsed?"

"No. He was high on something though. Could be anything. If it's that-" the witness mimes a needle into his arm, "-then I don't know what. It's a hot night."

"Sir," says the other police officer, shaking the man. "Sir, if you don't stand up and get walking, we're going to have to call an ambulance."

The man on the ground says something unintelligible, and stirs enough to show he's still alive. His display of trying to stand is halfhearted and pathetic, he can't even get his torso off the ground, and his feet don't move at all.

The police officer sighs, "Sir, I'm gonna give you two minutes to get up, and if you're not on your feet, then we're making the call."

I'm halfway home when I hear an ambulance speed by me. It might be for some car accident, but in my gut I know it's for that poor, unwashed bastard who's too high to realize that this is probably the worst night of his life.

* * *

Things that sound the same in any language: laughter, orgasms, and crying so hard that you're actually screaming.

I'm currently at the third option, through the clamor I still hear Shinji knocking on my door. I locked it at some point, because I knew this shit was going south. Things were going to turn ugly and all I could tell through the haze in my blood was that dumb cunt Hitomi wasn't going to have the god damn satisfaction of knowing she'd beaten me. I've cried so much in the last couple of months that I can sense it when it's coming – it's like a groundswell from the bottom of my stomach that rises until it boils over. I didn't cry this much, before. I think I was stronger during the Eva program, or at the very least I was still full of potential.

Then again, what is potential but a promise you break to yourself?

So, locked door, enough alcohol to kill most people, and here I am. This is near blackout stages – I'm already feeling hazy about the last couple of hours. My sheets are a ball around me, wet from tears and whatever else I've been doing. I take the pillow away from my face and I hold my breath, to listen.

There's a beat of silence, and then a voice, muffled by my door.

"…Asuka?"

I bury my face in the pillow again.

"Is she still here?!" I call, probably too loudly. I'm shouting through pillow and door and at least a quart of vodka. It _was_ good stuff. I'll give her that.

Shinji lets out a breath of disappointment. "Hitomi left almost an hour ago, Asuka. I told you that."

Oh. Oh, yeah, he did.

I've lucid enough to know that I'm fucked. There's no way out of this one. There's no playing it off like it was just a few drinks that got carried away. This is cry-for-help stuff. This is an inexcusable moment, and I'm hiding from it in my room like a little girl afraid of the monsters in her closet.

Who am I kidding? I am the monster. There's probably nothing more terrifying to me than myself. One day that will end, though, and things will be alright. Maybe the end isn't just a long sleep, but something inconceivably peaceful? I'd like to think so, but I don't really think it's anything at all. I think it's just… nothing. Blackness and void and no more having to look in the mirror. Which is something I guess.

But I have to talk to Shinji. I have to show him I'm okay right now.

I get up and I wipe the remnants of tears off of my face. It's probably a futile gesture, because I know I look like I just got hit by a truck, but there's still some part of me that has pride that I was once beautiful. I've always wanted him to remember me that way.

Beauty, like potential, seems to fizzle out pretty quickly.

I make several stumbling steps towards my door and I slide it open.

And I instantly feel like a child who's been caught stealing. Shinji glares at me, arms crossed and face frowning.

I crack my neck and I concentrate on not slurring my words. I wipe away the excess moisture I still feel clinging to my cheek.

"Hey, what's up?"

He sighs, burying his face in his hands.

"Come on," he says, looping an arm underneath me, "you need to take a shower."

Shinji starts dragging me across the apartment, but I hook my arm around the top of our table and I manage to halt him for a second.

"No, no! Wait," I say, almost mechanically. I feel the part at the back of my brain remembering how to deal with yourself when you're shitfaced. I decide to follow the suggestions, even though they sound completely ludicrous to me right now. "Water. I should drink water."

Shinji lets me collapse into a chair and turns around to fetch a cup for me and fill it from the tap.

I put my face in my hands and let all the shame catch up.

"I'm… I'm sorry I ruined your night," I mumble. I had to say it. Part of me hopes he didn't hear me.

"Asuka, come on. I don't care about that," Shinji replies, turning with the water. "She just kept asking me for dinner, and I wanted to be polite. I thought it would do you good, as well."

I let out a loud bark of a laugh.

"Oh yeah, I get along famously with strangers, Shinji. You know me."

"Well, if I'd known this would have happened, I would have been okay just being rude," he says.

I laugh again, tossing my head back to finish the water in a single chug. I start to stand up to fill it again when Shinji takes it from my hands.

"Just sit down for a minute."

And I do.

Tap back on. The inimitable sound of water filling a glass.

"I don't care about Hitomi, or the night, Asuka. I just need you to promise me something."

Yes, anything. "What's that?"

He hands me the glass. "That you're never going to do this shit again."

The water trembles in my hands. I'm not sure I'm thirsty anymore.

There was a time when he'd have rather leapt from a window than speak to me that way.

"Come again?" I say.

"This! This whole routine!" Shinji spreads his arms. "Drinking yourself blind! Locking yourself in your room with a fucking knife!"

There… there was a knife?

I don't even remember that. What was I…? Why did I grab the…?

He must see the shock on my face, because he softens before continuing.

"This… this isn't you, Asuka. This isn't you at all."

My throat is dry, and I take a long drink before continuing.

"…yes it is."

Shinji doesn't answer, so I continue, tears starting to form in my eyes again. It all comes tumbling out of me in a torrent, all of the things I was whispering into the pillow like a mantra – the thoughts that have been plaguing me for months. The things I think about every time I've finished a six pack alone.

"It _is_ me. This is me now. I'm not a hero! I was supposed to be _great_ , but I'm an alcoholic, underachieving _asshole_ , who doesn't even have the social acumen to make friends if they didn't know me before I became this shitstain! I'm nothing! I'm nobody at all!" I have to take a shuddering breath in to gather the air to finish. "I lie awake at night and I just think that if I weren't here, no one would even notice anymo-"

A slap to my face.

Which I wasn't counting on.

It stings hot red, across my right, and I'm so thrown by it that I put a hand to my cheek to feel if it really happened.

Which it did.

I look at him, and I realize that he's shaking, too.

"I'm only going to say this once, so listen up," his voice starts to gain volume, "you are Asuka Langley Sohryu. You're the greatest Evangelion pilot who's ever lived," his voice is shaking now. "You're the smartest person I've ever met, and honestly I think you can do whatever the hell you want to if you set your mind to it. Anything. You're just having a rough time, and you think you can't talk to me about it, which is ridiculous. Do you think I don't feel those things, too? We're in this _together_ , Asuka, you're probably my best friend in the world, and if we can't count on each other then I really don't know what…"

He trails off for a moment, before looking back into my eyes, with a rueful smile.

"And come on, Asuka. Don't say things like 'no one would notice'. I would notice." He looks at me, and I know that he's holding back tears as well. "I'd notice every day for the rest of my life, and you know damn well I would. I'd miss the hell out of you…"

He looks down.

"So don't say things like that. And don't do this shit again. You're better than this."

I blink.

"Promise me," he insists.

And I do.

After a moment, he looks back up and sighs.

"Come on," he says, taking my hand again. "Shower."

Several seconds later, he's slipping my shirt over my head, because I don't have the presence of mind to do it myself, anymore.

And then blessed water is pouring down on my face, and I feel the love of god.

I… I never realized that the Evas ending would have hurt Shinji, too. Even if he didn't identify with it the way I did, he must have felt _some_ repercussions from the whole life he knew ending in a flash. He was closer to Misato than I was, certainly, and Rei. God knows where they are now. Ghosts in the abyss that was Nerv.

Christ, why did I never talk to him about this? Did I think he would hurt me? He's Shinji! Shinji couldn't hurt someone if he trie-

And that's when I realize I'm naked.

"H-hey! Get back in here!" I yell, covering myself. He's beyond the shower curtain, so there's no way he can see anything right now, but my embarrassment hasn't figured that out yet. I definitely didn't undress myself, and right now, even with everything that's happened tonight, that thought terrifies me beyond reason.

"Asuka, are you okay?!" the reply comes from over the divider. He's standing in the bathroom, for sure.

"Did um… did you see…" my words are flopping around like fish out of water. "…what did you just see?!"

I hear him chuckle, from beyond the glass.

"I closed my eyes, Asuka. I didn't see anything except underwear."

I turn a bright vermillion. "You idiot! That's private stuff!"

"I _wash_ your underwear, Asuka, I know what it all looks like," another laugh. "I got you down to there and you did the rest. With my eyes closed and facing the other direction. I swear."

I open my mouth to prepare a string of obscenities, but several seconds later I close it, because I believe him completely. He's being a gentleman, even now. He always is. How many times this month has he had to take care of my drunk ass? How many times has he cooked breakfast for me when I was so hungover I couldn't open my eyes? He let me cheat off of his test for that one time I forgot to study, he picks up the groceries when I don't have time, he washes my sheets, he… he's everything I've ever wanted in a…

After several long moments standing under a torrent of water, I open my mouth again.

"I think we should date."

No laughter now. Silence and the sound of a person thinking, if that's a sound at all. I can hear it over the running water, in my state.

"…what?"

"I don't ever want you to see that girl again. I want to be your girlfriend and I want us to date. I think we should do that," I swallow, ashamed that I didn't have the courage to do this face-to-face.

In the past, when I have, I've always made sure to make a spectacle of it, you know? I'd make sure that everyone was watching and witnessing this goddess condescend to whatever idiot it happened to be, but this time… This is messy. This is wrong. This isn't the way you're supposed to ask people out.

I wish I could rewind time and take my words back. Or hell, just not drink so much in the first place, because I was jealous of some tramp who thought she-

"Yeah, okay," Shinji says, beyond the shower.

"Huh?"

"Yeah, let's date," he says. "I think it's a good idea, Asuka."

There are too many emotions happening in my head right now for me to even calculate what the fuck is happening.

"So we're dating now?" I ask.

"Yeah, I guess so."

There's another long silence, as all of these words sink in on both sides of the thin, decisive, dividing wall of the shower.

What do I do now? I'm supposed to say something, right? Do I try and be sexy? I don't feel very sexy right now, I feel the opposite of it.

I just feel like… a nice, spreading warmth in my chest, but it's one I don't know how to translate into words.

So I say: "…cool."

"Yeah, cool." He clears his throat, "do you need any other help? You sound more… there, than before."

"Yeah, I think I'm alright now. Thank you, Shinji."

I can picture his smile. I know he likes when I say his name like that.

"I'll talk to you in the morning. Feel better, Asuka," he says. "Goodnight," and he steps out of the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

There goes my idiot roommate. My _boyfriend_. The word feels new in my mind, unlike anything I've ever felt, even though I've had my share of boyfriends. This boyfriend is Shinji. That makes it... you know, different.

…

Oh god, what have I just done?

* * *


	4. Chapter 4

"There's nothing you and I won't do,  
I'll stop the world and melt with you."  
\- Modern English

* * *

The first time I kissed Asuka Langley Sohryu, it was disastrous, and it ruined my confidence with women for the next three or so years.

The second time I kissed her, it was pouring and neither of us had brought umbrellas to class.

"Gott verdammt!" the redhead next to me yells, soaking wet from head to foot. My _girlfriend_.

Huh. That still feels new.

Right now, however, she's my angry girlfriend. "The one time we didn't bring umbrellas! I _told_ you to pack it, but noooo!" She places her hand over her chest and cocks a hip to the side. "Look, I'm Shinji, and I have faith in _the damn weather forecast!"_

She kicks the small water puddle on the ground, splashing both of our shins. Not that either of us could get any wetter. I shake my head and sigh.

"I don't even think they use this bus stop anymore. We're probably stuck here until this rain lets up."

Asuka lets out a guffaw to my left, fishing around in her bag for her cigarettes.

"Yeah, well it sure ain't my fault, ace. '30% chance' my ass. I could have told you it was going to rain when we left this morning. I did tell you, in point of fact. Dunno if I mentioned that." Bringing her hand out, the stares ruefully at the carton, dyed a deep tobacco color by the water. "Oh _come on_!"

I watched the Marlboros sail out into the rainy abyss with a dark sort of satisfaction.

Next to me, Asuka crosses her arms over her chest, falling back against the wall. "Great. Just great…"

I turn my head away, so she doesn't see the smile spreading across my face. It'll only piss her off more.

I would never tell her, but the more time has gone on, the more I've realized that Asuka is spectacularly beautiful when angry. Not _deeply_ angry, per se, but fired up for sure. That's when her eyes spark at their most fiercely intelligent. Her brow creases down and it frames everything just… angelically. I don't know, I've never understood it. The older I get, the more I'm attracted to stronger women. It's something to do with parent issues, I'm sure. I've sure got a lot of those kicking around after all these years.

I pat her on the shoulder, and give it a little squeeze. "It's been raining for a while now, I'm sure this will all blow over soon."

"Yeah…" she mumbles, but she doesn't sound convinced. My hand lingers on her shoulder, and I feel it start to tremble a little.

I cock an eyebrow at her. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. It's just… you know," she shrugs, her shoulders shaking, "colder than I thought it would be."

"You know,I told _you_ to bring your jacket this morning."

"Oh, shut up," Asuka taps my foot with hers, and falls silent.

The sound of rain on the tin roof over us gives me the impression that we're the only two people in the world. The stop is at a bend in the road, on a hill, with green branches framing the road, now several shades darker than their usual hue. A car passes slowly on the opposite us, and then there's only us and the water hitting the shelter over our heads.

With a soft shuffle, I feel the gentle weight of Asuka leaning against me, and I wrap an arm firmly around her shoulder, tugging her to my side.

It's been more of this lately for us. Ever since the night we began, it's been… tentative. Warm, but I think we're both still a little confused who we are around each other now. She was certainly right about dating changing things; I measure my words a little more now. I'm still unsure how forward I can be.

But that being said, any awkwardness has been outweighed by the perks. We've been holding hands a lot, though I think on some level she's still kind of shy about people _seeing_ us hold hands. Except for Hitomi. She always makes sure to grab my hand when that poor girl is in eyeshot. Cuddling has gone up, and I've enjoyed that quite a bit. We were on the couch the other night, and she actually fell asleep on my chest. It was nice, it was just… us. The way I thought it would be, all along. Comfortable.

Asuka places her head against me and sighs.

"I'm not really angry," she mutters, "you know that, right? I'm just annoyed."

"Yeah, I know," I chuckle, "we may have just started dating, but I've known you quite a while. I can tell the difference."

She nudges her finger into my side, playfully, and then settles against me. She's trying to get warm, I assume.

"What are you thinking about?" she asks, which is also 'a thing' now, I guess. Ever since that night, Asuka seems increasingly earnest about knowing what's happening in my head at any given moment. Haven't figured out what _that's_ all about yet, because sometimes the answer has been… well, not much at all. I'd been thinking about classes, or what to make for dinner that night. Domestic stuff. Uninteresting, largely, but she always listens, which is also different.

"Nothing really. The rain, and all that." I look down at her, "You know, actually, I was sort of wondering… "

And I trail off, because I hadn't realized until this moment how truly close her face was to mine. I can feel the warmth of her breath on my skin, blazing hot when contrasted with the dampness of our clothing. I see the slight pattern of freckles across her nose, which I always forget are there. I think she's embarrassed by them, perceiving them as somehow childish, but I've always thought they accentuated everything very nicely. And that blue, of course. The blue I could just fall into forever.

Her eyes, however, betray turmoil underneath. Even if there's nothing going on in my head, it seems that at any given moment Asuka is thinking about entirely too much. Her eyes dart back and forth nervously to mine, trying to read my expression, asking for… permission? She's worried. Something's worrying her.

Why is she worried?

Why would I worry her? What could she possibly -?

And then, before my mind can dissuade me from doing so, I lean down and press my lips against hers. A soft gasp escapes her lips before we connect, and there's a second of stillness in her body before I feel her sigh, and melt against me.

She's accepting it. She wanted this, too. It's with surprise I feel her tongue probe at my mouth, but I let it in gladly. That never happened the first time around, and the sensation is nearly overwhelming. I've wanted this for so long, I can't even remember a time when I didn't.

She wraps her arms around my back, and for several minutes, we're completely alone.

And the moment is ours.

And it will be forever.

That was kiss two.

* * *

If there were a wall between us, it was fractured with our second first-kiss, but it wasn't broken down completely.

The break came somewhat later.

A month after the fact, I'm settling in bed for the night when light floods the room, and I see Asuka in the doorway.

"Move over," she whispers, laying herself next to me on the bed. It's not exactly one designed for two people, but I think that's also sort of the appeal right now. Cuddling and human touch and all that. She tries to relax, and pulls the sheets so they're mostly over herself.

A long beat of silence, before she shifts again, uncomfortably.

"Come on, Ikari, how much room do you take up, anyway?"

"…I'm actually halfway off of the bed."

She scoffs. "That's because you're not touching me."

Dunno how to respond to that exactly.

"I mean…"

She glances over at me in the dark. "What's the problem?"

"Well," I lick my lips, choosing my words carefully. She had on a maximum of two pieces of clothing – the top one being far too loose and the bottom one being far too tight. It was a dangerous combination, even in reduced light. For my part, I had always slept in just the boxer shorts I adopted at seventeen. So between us we had three things being worn. Not exactly school-appropriate attire. "…you're barely wearing anything, Asuka."

"And what, that disgusts you? Come on…" her voice softens in the dark, "I didn't think that dating would just be holding hands and kissing."

My heart literally just stopped.

"N-not _tonight_ , of course!" She trips over words, trying to backtrack. "But… you know. I'm not, like… offended if you want to… touch things…"

There was dead silence in the room.

Is that an invitation? I can't tell exactly how many things I'm allowed to touch, or in what capacity. Or when, or where, or how. Is Asuka the kind of person that would like me to just take the lead and be assertive or would she find that threatening? For as long as we've cohabitated, we've never spoken openly about sexual likes or dislikes, so I'm literally flying blind.

Of course, that's if she even means ' _touch me_ ' touch me. She might just mean embracing, but she's being very obtuse about it if she is.

Regardless, I've been staring at her for the better part of a minute now, and I make sure to shuffle back towards her on the bed. Grabbing my arm, she pulls me into a spooning position, and places the blankets over the both of us. Spooning is literally the only way we're both going to fit on the bed, a bed that I had never considered 'small' until precisely this moment, and it's not at all unpleasant.

I let out a sigh and settle in, making sure to keep my hips just slightly disconnected from her bottom, which I'm all-too-painfully-aware is only separated from me by my boxers, and the very thin garment that she's wearing. Whatever you call it. I'm trying not to think too hard about her body right now.

I shut my eyes and try to concentrate on literally anything else. I have a test tomorrow morning for European History, and I was actually meaning to ask her about it. I've never been very good with that stuff, and I'd bet quite a bit that she knows more about it than-

With a gentle nudge, Asuka pushes her ass into the front of my waist. The monster. I'm literally at the edge of the bed – there's nowhere more I can retreat to.

Literally anything else. Don't think about this. _Anything else at all_.

Which doesn't work. With absolute helplessness, I feel myself grow stiff against her.

I wince in the dark, holding my breath. She's going to feel it, and she's going to storm out of the room, I'm sure of it. This will be the end – the Asuka rage storm to end them all. I grit my teeth and expect the worst.

But that doesn't happen. It's several moments before I realize that Asuka is holding her breath as well. What is she doing?

Maybe… she's waiting to see what I'll do about it? She's facing away from me, but even if I could see her face, I wouldn't be entirely sure how to proceed, if she wanted it. How can you tell if a girl is horny, anyway? I've never been good at picking up on those signals, but she does have a point: if we're truly dating now, things like this are certainly on the table. Hell, it's half the reason most people get into relationships at all.

She's still here. She still hasn't moved. She's still waiting.

With my heart pounding like a drum in my chest, I gently slide my hand up to the most southward hem of her shirt – it's one of those soft, oversized ones they sell to girls to sleep in. Like Victoria's Secret or something. I wash it every week, but right now there's nothing on my mind except my hand, and its proximity to her naked skin underneath that shirt.

This is the moment of no return. I could ruin everything right here.

Oh, please don't let me ruin everything…

After several seconds of steeling myself, I slide my hand under the shirt, and start inching it up her stomach.

Her skin is molten hot underneath my fingers, and smoother than I'd ever imagined. For the amount of beer she drinks, her stomach is surprisingly taut. I find the gentle dip of her navel and trace a circle around it in wonder, which prompts her to laugh softly. My hand freezes.

"What?" I whisper, terrified.

"It's nothing, it just tickled," she says back, and there's a smile in her voice. She wets her lips. "You can keep going, you know. If you want."

"Are you sure?"

She presses herself slightly more against my boxers. "Positive."

Wow.

Okay, wow.

This is happening. This is literally every high school fantasy I've ever had, and it's happening right here, at this exact moment. I'm not entirely sure how to process it.

My hand continues its journey up her stomach, until I start to feel her skin swell outwards, and this is territory that I'm truly afraid of now. I've seen her breasts once, but they've certainly changed since then, and the memory of that moment remains a poisonous one to me. I don't know if I'm ready to confront that yet.

_She gave you permission, though,_ says the part of my brain that I wish spoke more often.

I… maybe I'm misunderstanding.

_Come on, Shinji. If that wasn't a written invitation, then I don't really know what is._

I'm still hesitant. This is a big moment for me.

Asuka shifts somewhat uncomfortably in my arms.

"…Shinji?" she whispers, "We uh… we don't have to go further if you're not… if it makes you uncomfortable. I," she gropes for words, "that really wasn't my intention. We can take things slower, if you want, I just thought that you would-"

Ah, fuck it.

My hand slides down her stomach, past her navel and her waist and down the front of her underwear, eliciting a moan from her that I never thought I'd hear. She arches her back against me, pressing herself even more firmly into my front, causing friction against my already beleaguered penis.

Oh, wow, she's…

She's actually very wet. That was not what I was expecting. I move my fingers around to get a better angle and I feel Asuka squirm, moaning again. It was a little louder this time.

I could… do this to her? The thought of me could? No, that's impossible. There's no way that I could possibly-

Reaching back, she loops her arm around my head and brings my mouth into hers. There's a _need_ in the kiss. A tacit exclamation, imploring me not to stop whatever it is I'm doing down there.

So I don't.

She's only making vowel sounds now. They're not even words and they're the most erotic thing I've ever heard in my life.

As my fingers pick up speed, so does Asuka's writhing against me. She's… she's going to put a quick end to me if she keeps making that noise and moving like that, but I couldn't care less right now. There's nothing in my brain at all except for her.

Asuka Langley Sohryu wants me. She's my girlfriend and she _wants_ me. The very thought is overwhelming, on top of the heat and her tongue in my mouth and the feeling of parts of her I never dreamed I would actually ever encounter. Her hair and her eyes and the sound of her voice when she-

"Oh, god, stop! Shinji, stop for just a second!" she says, pulling away slightly, which is disappointing to say the least. The last thing I want to happen right now is 'stop'.

She removes my hand from her front and pushes me onto my back, climbing on top of me and putting her face near mine. We're both out of breath from the encounter, and for several moments, I see her studying me. Her eyes are darting again, more silent gears are turning as this brilliant, beautiful woman weighs options in her head. I can't possibly imagine what she's thinking.

After several seconds, she grins devilishly.

"There's no way in hell you're gonna make me cum first. I'd never give you the satisfaction." She presses a finger against my nose, and smiles more gently, and murmurs "Baka-Shinji," before planting soft kiss on my lips.

And then she's kissing her way down my front.

And then she's taking my boxers off.

And her pride remains intact, which I'm only somewhat embarrassed to say takes very little time at all.

* * *

Then the floodgates were open, and not just the carnal things, either.

It's funny how when you start to become physically intimate with another person you start to open up in all sorts of ways. It's just little things – you hold each other's gaze more easily, you start to have inside jokes, you just… you _know_ them more, strangely. If you're doing it right, anyway. I hooked up with someone once, near the end of high school, and that didn't have the same effect at all. It just made me feel used and discarded.

I don't know. Some people can make it work, I suppose, but I've never been one of them. Once was enough for me to know I didn't like it.

Being in bed with someone, you realize, is just an extension of being with that person – their personality translates to what they're like to have a sexual encounter with.

For example, Asuka can be very aggressive, but she's also… very caring actually. And strangely talkative. She asks if she's going too far, she asks if you like things, she backs off quickly if you're not enjoying something, and so on. There's no sense that you're being used for pleasure, only the sense that she's actually interested in you. Me, I suppose. It feels like a gift.

Maybe I'm just pontificating though. We haven't had sex yet, which is a little strange, but I'm more than happy to take things at the pace she wants to.

Besides, I've discovered that I have quite a gift for going down on her, which I've been getting a lot of mileage out of. If we had just jumped right into sex, I don't know if I ever would have felt her hands on the back of my head of heard her voice fill a room like that. It's quite… intoxicating, actually. There are nights I find I relish it more than she does. Well, I enjoy her _enjoyment_ of it, anyway.

I… I feel myself falling in love with her. _Really_ falling, I mean, not just being attracted to, and it's scary, because for the first time I know what she was talking about outside of the bar all those eons ago.

Because this must be the 'honeymoon phase', and the sinking feeling in my stomach is me wondering will happen when the honeymoon is over.

* * *


	5. Chapter 5

"And I'd say I love you  
But saying it aloud, is hard.  
Words are futile devices."  
\- Sufjan Stevens

* * *

"Hey! What's the big mystery?" Shinji laughs through the door to our bathroom. "What are you doing in there?"

"J-just… gimme a second!"

I'm not ready. Seeing them on my head again almost feels like an alcoholic's violation of sobriety. I clip them into place and feel the slight tingling I always used to back in the day; not a heightening of senses, per se, but a slight static discharge that settles almost as quickly as you perceive it. I tried to throw them away so many times, but I could never truly bring myself to.

Sighing, I muss my hair up in an attempt to make myself feel sexy, but I'm actually nervous. Ugh. Five months of dating and I'm actually _nervous_ about him seeing me this way.

It's pathetic. I wouldn't have been nervous back when I wore these things regularly.

Maybe the difference is now he can actually reject me, whereas before I would have laughed any serious advance off and remained untouched and victorious, above such petty human emotions. Power shifts in weird ways like that. I feel a chill and self-consciously cross my arms over my chest.

_He doesn't love you_ , the angry red ghosts at the top of my head whisper, _no one could ever really love you. He's in love with a fantasy - a girl he used to touch himself to_.

You're lying. It wouldn't have lasted this long if he didn't love the real me.

_We **are** the real you. We are the sad little girl who never amounted to anything. We are the sum of all of your failures._

I frown, and look away from the reflection in the bathroom mirror.

I'm… scared. I'm actually really fucking scared right now, but I have to do this. I have to know.

"Asuka? Are you… coming to bed?" His voice is softer this time, with some of the humor gone.

I bite my lower lip, steel myself, and walk to the door.

Opening it, I reveal myself wearing nothing but my Unit-02 sync clips. After a beat, I see Shinji's eyes go wide in shock.

There is silence, and then he lets out a breath I didn't even realize he was holding.

"…well?" I ask.

"You look…" Shinji pauses, his eyes scanning up and down my body before coming to rest at the top of my head. He closes his mouth and shakes his head gently. "You look beautiful, Asuka. You always do."

I feel the blush creep up my face. It's not that I haven't heard Shinji say so before, but he always sounds so damn sincere when he says it. There's not mistaking it for anything but honesty. My fear is still there, however. I want to close the door and hide forever, but I need this. I need to know.

"…and what about _them_?" I motion upwards with my chin.

"The clips?" He blinks. "What _about_ them?"

"Do you like them? Hate them? Any long-suppressed thoughts firing back up?" I swallow anxiously. "Come on, give me something, you dummy."

Shinji smiles and shrugs. "Honestly, I don't really care. _They_ don't matter, Asuka – you do." He chuckles. "I mean, you can start wearing them again if you like, but it doesn't matter to me either way. I didn't even notice you were wearing them at fir-"

I nearly leap across room, and I seal off his stupid, perfect mouth with a kiss.

His hands find my body, and I'm lost to the world but indescribably found.

I never wear those damned things again.

* * *

The sixteen hour plane ride is interminable and I hate the shit out of it. I'm dying for a cigarette when we pick up our bags in Munich. Shinji only flinches a little when he sees me light up. Even after three years of smoking, I know he hates it.

I've cut way back, to my credit. I used to need one almost every half-hour, and now I can go several days without one. Lately, it's pretty much only if I'm super stressed or super drunk. Thanks to the in-flight drinks, I'm a little bit of both, but I know the craving is mostly from having just spent the entire day in a fucking tin box. First class be damned – I hate being in things I can't run away from, and there's no emergency exit when you're four miles over China.

Also, it reminds me a little too eerily of the other monstrous machine I used to sit in for hours at a time. Formerly proud memories, now only painful.

So, on my way out of the airport I saw the pack of Gauloises, which I haven't tasted in half a lifetime, and here I am observing Shinji as he tastes the air of my homeland. He jumps slightly as a hurrying couple bumps into him.

"Es tut mit… uh…" he mumbles shyly, looking down as if the correct German may somehow be written on the ground. I can't help but crack a smile.

He sighs. In Japanese: "I'm never gonna get this language."

"Aww come on," I say, taking his hand. "If anything bad happens, you have a translator. And you're sleeping with her, so she probably won't lead you astray." I give him my most reassuring grin and squeeze his hand a little.

"And besides," I continue, "you've been studying German for what, three months? I'm surprised you can form a sentence at all, to be honest. You're doing pretty damn well, give yourself a little credit." I bump his shoulder with my own and he brightens up a little.

"You're right. It's going okay, I guess…"

"Genau."

"Everyone keeps trying to speak English to me, though."

"Yeah, it's pretty much what they default to if they're not sure where you're from. Welcome to Europe." I shrug, showing exactly what I think of that practice. Shinji sulks again.

"Why do they do that?"

I blow smoke and shrug. "They were a superpower once. Old habits and lingua franca are hard to break."

Shinji nods, but still looks a little glum, as if not learning an entire system of communication in an impossible amount of time was somehow a personal failing. He takes everything far too much to heart, as I've told him before.

"You worry too much," I would say, laughing it off but meaning it.

Presently, he still sulks.

"…I don't think I'm ever going to get English, to be honest."

"Yeah, well fuck it. Stupid nonsense language, anyway." I stub out the cigarette with the heel of my sneaker, and we begin to walk towards the taxis, Shinji doing the majority of the bag carrying. I brought more stuff than him, but it always seems to work out this way. Funny, that.

"We're uh…" Shinji trails off as I try to hail something. "Your dad doesn't speak Japanese, does he?"

"He speaks better Japanese than my mom spoke German, I'll say that." I let out a laugh. "He's okay. He gets by. I don't know the last time he practiced it, though. Might be a little rusty."

A taxi pulls to a stop in front of us, and I start taking the bags from Shinji and loading them into the back.

"Has he ever met one of your uh…" Shinji coughs, "You know. Your important friends?"

I close the trunk and lock him into a gaze. As if.

_As if there was any boyfriend worth mentioning before you._

Instead of answering, I place my hand on the side of his face, and kiss him deeply, opening my mouth and giving his tongue a few reassuring strokes with my own. When we separate, I see surprise in his eyes, and I gently pat his cheek.

"There's a first time for everything, Baka-Shinji."

Taxi goes to train. Train goes to Heidelberg.

* * *

On the train, Shinji is asleep and I'm lost in thought, staring out the window at the impressionistic blur of the countryside. It's almost Christmas and for the first time since I was thirteen, I'm spending Christmas in Germany.

I've told Shinji all about the Weinachtsmart in Heidelberg, and how I used to walk there as a child. I used to love Christmas dearly – that was when my whole family came together and everything was warm at home. Even after all the heartache and hell, I still miss that warmth dearly.

I wonder if it stills smells the way I remember? Probably not. I haven't been back for most of my lifetime now. He's only _vaguely_ aware of Shinji, my one-time copilot and now seven-month boyfriend. He's been my first everything, save love, but I don't even know if Kaji really counts for that now.

I felt like it was love at the time – I certainly wanted him very badly, but I was fourteen, and I'm not even totally sure you're able to rationalize things like love then. Everything is overwhelming when you're that young, be it affection or desire.

Shinji was certainly my first time sleeping with a man, which, you know, went…

Well, it probably went about as well as it could have. There was pain, there was blood, and then there was bliss. Bliss and the completion of a promise that had been neglected for far too long.

After the first time, it was like a honeymoon – I'm not sure there was free time that first week that we _weren't_ having sex, or doing anything that came to our minds as far as sex acts go. There was lust, surely, but there was also tenderness; the joy of discovering sex with someone safe. There is the strength of being friends and talking about things from earlier in the day when we're both naked as the day we came. There was the time we converted to one bed, and how strangely okay I was when our friends find out. I thought I would be embarrassed, but I had strength knowing it was him. And finally the beginning of the pull, towards thinking that this wasn't just physical intimacy, or some fling, but... love.

I can't pinpoint the moment exactly, but my strongest memory of the fall is being in his arms, drifting to sleep and thinking:

' _This is so much better than I thought it would be.'_

The train barrels onwards, towards my father and into my past, into a hometown I have all but forgotten.

* * *


	6. Chapter 6

"I had a dream and you were in it  
The blue of your eyes was infinite  
You seemed to be in love with me  
Which isn't very realistic."  
\- The Magnetic Fields

* * *

The first thing I can't help but notice about Asuka's house – or rather her father's house, I suppose – was that it hit the exact tenor of largeness where everything seems empty and under-decorated. It's the kind of house that was undeniably impressive, yes, but also had a strange aura of vacancy. A house that wasn't a home.

"He doesn't spend all his time here," Asuka says, as if reading my thoughts. She hangs her coat on a hanger that seems to be carved from driftwood. "He has a lot of other people decorate it for him."

"Did your mom decorate it, before?"

"No," Asuka sniffs condescendingly at some ostentatious floor-to-ceiling mirror, "she just hired people with better taste."

I can't help but feel that this house is actually a mansion. You could fit three families in here, with room to spare, but the only person we've seen was the (rather rude) butler who opened the door and beckoned us into the foyer and abandoned us to our own devices while he saw if Asuka's father 'was available'. There was the unenviable feeling of being 'made time for'.

I clear my throat, trying to think of what to say. She's obviously uncomfortable, but I'm not sure if she needs space or support right now. Asuka hates it when I baby her too much.

Of course, not enough attention can also raise her ire, which keeps things interesting, I suppose. A year in and I finally feel like I'm starting to get her pattern more.

I grimace and avert my gaze. This is her show. Let her set the pace.

"So…" I venture as the wait drags on. "When was the last time you saw your dad?"

"When I departed for NERV with Kaji," she mumbles, and I try to hide my surprise. That was… I mean, that was almost a decade ago.

"Have you guys… talked since then?"

"Yeah, now and then on the phone," Asuka sighs, "he's a busy man."

"What's he do?"

"Business."

Oh. Gotcha.

I can see her face reflected in that stupid mirror. She can't stop staring at it. I think she's trying to practice the face she'll put on when her father finally deigns to show up. I practiced faces, too, back in Tokyo-3, before Misato arrived. At the time I had naively thought my father would come to gather me himself. From the train station.

Hours in bathrooms, staring at mirrors, trying desperately to make something appear in them that I didn't hate. All those faces were quickly forgotten the moment I saw Unit-01 for the first time.

Getting to know Asuka better has made me realize just how similar we actually are. _"We're the same,"_ she told me once, _"we just went in different directions."_

As I watch her try to conjure up the excited daughter, I realize she doesn't know how right she is.

Twenty more minutes pass before Asuka puts her bag down with a hunch of resignation.

"Let's go to town," she announces.

"Y-you don't want to wait?" I ask, not entirely sure how to proceed.

She grabs her coat from the driftwood. "He'll be here when we get back. I want to get drunk."

* * *

Which sounds like a terrible idea, but in lieu of the mirrors and the faces I think I know what she means.

Maybe this will be a good thing? A little time to blow off steam, just us?

"I mean _reeeaally!_ " Asuka slurs, taking a large swig from her beer. "Where does he get off?! I travel halfway urrrround the world, and he lets me wait with the butler?! **The butler.** "

I can't really argue with her, but that's because I'm also pretty damn tipsy. I'm only halfway through my pint and I'm feeling it. Admittedly, I've never been much of a drinker. Asuka's on her third pint.

"I- I mean," I begin, words slipping through my fingers as I search for them. "I mean, he is your _father_ , Asuka."

" _Oh, come on_!" she yells, causing some of the bar to turn around and see what the hell these two foreigners are screaming about. "He's awful, Shinji! He made me wait in the foyer of his house like a _pet!_ What do I need him for?! He obviously doesn't care that I'm here! Why should I care if he worries where I am?!"

I feel a pain of sympathy that's all too real. Gendo's face comes unbidden to my mind's eye.

I raise my beer and take another sip.

"I hated my father," I mumble. It's something I've never come to terms with saying out loud.

"Yeah? Good! Because Gendo Ikari was a massive fucking asshole," Asuka looks away, swilling her drink. "He deserved what happened to him."

I look at her for a second, my thoughts careening from her statement.

There's the initial indignity – the hurt pride of the family name still stinging. After a moment though, I realize she's... she's _right._ I hated that man so deeply, and I'm sick to death of defending him.

I feel a smile creep across my face and raise my pint.

"Fuck fathers," I say deceisively.

"Yeah!" roars Asuka, a giant grin across her reddened face. "I'll toast to that! Fuck fathers! Fuck 'em both!"

"Kampai."

"Hell yeah, 'kampai!'"

She tosses her pint against mine, spilling quite a bit of the liquid over the counter.

Tossing the pints back, I get lost in the toffee taste of the beer, and feel triumphant. When I put my glass down, my girlfriend is laughing at her empty glass and wiping her mouth.

"I'll go for one more," she says, standing. "Want one?"

I shrug.

"Does it look like my _dad_ is here?" I say sarcastically.

Asuka puts her hands on my cheeks and kisses my forehead emphatically, before disappearing into the crowd.

* * *

_What the hell is that noise?_ Touji Suzuhara thinks, before he realizes that awful noise is his phone, and it's ringing right next to his head. Turning over in his bed, he answers the call.

_There better be a damn good reason for this._

"…who the hell is calling now?"

"Touji?! It's Touji! We got him!" Touji hears a distinctly unenthusiastic cheer in the background.

"…Shinji?"

"Yeah! Touji it's me! I calling you from Germany! Geeeerrrrmany! Doit-chland!"

"Deutschland," Touji hears Asuka's voice correct Shinji over the phone, which only prompts more giggles from the former pilot.

"Asuka, your language is so silly."

Touji blinks in the darkness.

"...are you drunk?"

"What? Yes." Shinji's laugh sounds over the line. "Oh wait! Asuka wants to talk to you!"

"No I don't."

"Yes you do! Touji's your friend, too!"

A great shuffling, and the sounds of weak protest before a sigh:

"Hey idiot, what's up?"

"…it's four am," Touji answers honestly.

"Oh yeah. Sorry, it's a lot earlier here."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"…stellar."

A beat of silence, where Touji considers why he's not hanging up.

"…so Shinji's drunk?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"Has that… ever happened before?"

"Um," Asuka begins, "I'm not entirely sure actually. I've never seen it firsthand, if so."

Deep in the distance, Touji hears an unrestrained cry of joy. In the voice of Shinji: _"My girlfriend is amazing and we saved this world with silly robots!"_

"…huh," Touji mumbles, massaging the area between his eyes.

" _We have sex now!"_

"Wh-what?! Hey idiot, don't just go sayin-"

" _It's amazing sex! You guys don't even-"_

The sound of someone screaming and falling. Hushed gasps from a crowd.

"Shinji! Shinji wait no, that's not a-"

Merciful silence.

Touji calmly turns off his phone and rolls over to go back to his blessed world of never fucking hearing about this shit again.

* * *

"Here: water," I hear her say in my ear, pushing a water bottle into my hand. "Water is good. Water is your best friend now."

"But I thought _you_ were my best friend?" I whine, leaning my head against her shoulder and nuzzling in towards warmth. I feel a chuckle roll through her body.

"Well, that's very sweet of you, Shinji, but drink the damn water and stop being a drunk nightmare."

She sips from her own water bottle I feel her shake her head to clear it. We're sitting on a bench somewhere in the lower town, far away from a bed or her father's house. The thought of that grim, hollow mansion sends a shiver down me. Asuka lights up next to me, gently puffing away.

"Water, Shinji. Water, remember?"

"I don't _wanna_ drink water," I hear myself say. She sighs, with exasperation.

"Man, is this what I'm like when I'm drunk?"

"No," I slur, "Yerrr worse."

The bark of laughter startles me, and I feel her hands pushing me into a sitting position. "Come on, dummy," she says unscrewing the top. "Now drink this, or all those things we do that you just told all of Heidelberg about won't ever happen again."

This convinces me. I sit and drink sullenly.

"What was _in_ that beer?" I ask.

"Oh, it's Vetter's," she says, sipping her water. "Their beer is 13-proof."

"Wait, so I just the equivalent of two pints of wine?"

"Uh... yeah," Asuka looks kind of surprised by this herself, as if this never occurred to her. She cracks a smile. "Yeah, I guess you did. Sorry about that – I was just so angry that I needed to-"

"Nnnno, it's okay. I gettit." More water. Water is my best friend now. "Just gimme a heads-up next time, yeah?"

She laughs.

"Yeah, I will. I think you're pretty fucked up."

"I'm sorry," I mumble into the top of the water bottle.

"No, it's my fault," she says, looping her arm around my neck. "It's really my fault, Shinji. I should have thought. You don't have to apologize about anything right now."

She holds me, and all my world is blessed warmth. I breathe in her scent and know I'm home, even though I'm six-thousand miles away from the house I was born in. This is heaven. I could live her forever.

I say something into her side.

"Huh?" Asuka asks, "What was that?"

I sit up and look into her eyes.

"I said 'I love you.'"

For one of the first times since I've known her, Asuka Langley Sohryu cannot speak.

"Wh-what? What are you talking abou-"

"I mean I love you. I really do. And I know I'm drunk, Asuka, but that doesn't mean it's not the truth."

I focus all my energy on staring into her eyes. It feels like falling into an ocean, with water I can swim in.

Her mouth hangs ajar. I see her face flush red and tears start to come to her eyes. God, she's never looked more beautiful.

"Shinji, I-"

And that's the last thing I remember before I pitch forward onto the cobblestones and throw up.

* * *


	7. Chapter 7

"There's nothing you can do that can't be done  
Nothing you can sing that can't be sung  
Nothing you can say, but you can learn how to play the game  
It's easy."  
\- The Beatles

* * *

_A memory:_

"You know what's weird?"

"What's that?"

"Languages."

I look at my boyfriend and puff at a cigarette. "…go on."

"Well, just that like, we need words to communicate thoughts, you know?" Shinji continues. He sounds like a total idiot right now, but I know he's trying to prove a point, so I let him continue. "I mean, words are _important_ , right? But they're not really tangible things, they're just sounds that we all decide together have a meaning."

"…you're losing me, Ikari."

"I mean," Shinji's brow furrows in that way it does when he really mulls something over. "Well, 'like' and 'love' are synonyms, right? But they're not _really_. Saying 'I like you' to someone, is important, but the connotation is super different if you use the other."

"Yeah, sure. What's your point?"

I see Shinji's shoulders shrug through his military-style jacket.

"…I dunno, I was just thinking about it. Someone had to think all those words up at some point, right? They had to sit down and say to themselves: 'Okay, _this_ word means 'nausea' or whatever," he breathes out for a second, thinking more.

"And it's funny," he continues, "because we have an infinite amount of sounds we can ascribe an infinite amount of words to, and they still don't… always work."

I ash the cigarette on the ground next to me, but the ashes disperse before I see them hit the ground.

"What do you mean they don't work?" I ask, scoffing. "Words are all we have. We think with words."

"No, we have feelings, too. They're purer than words," Shinji insists. I can see him puzzling out something under that stupid mop-top of hair and am a little ashamed to admit how deeply it affects me. "Words are… futile, at the end of the day. They can never capture the really complicated things."

"Like what?" I ask.

"Well, like 'love'. What's love mean, anyway?" Shinji continues, spreading his arms wide. "I can love a place, a person, a dog, some food, but they don't mean the same thing when I say it. But we say the same words! We say 'I love that'. Isn't that odd?"

Shinji looks at me with an imploring look, daring me to challenge his logic. And for once, I cannot.

I toss my cigarette somewhere off to my left and turn to him.

"Well, I know one thing," I say to him, "They might be futile, but words are all we have, so when you say something to me, you'd better goddamn mean it."

* * *

Shinji is slowly recovering from his hangover, and I hate that I find it cute. I shouldn't. I should tell myself that this is his body battling the same poison that's haunted my life since I was 16.

But if I'm being honest? It's goddamn adorable. He's mistaken the pillow I was using for me, and every once in a while I see him burrow his face deeper into it, trying to block out the morning and what I'm sure is a blinding pain in his head.

Shinji's breathing evens out, and I can tell he's asleep again. Good. It'll hurt less the longer he sleeps.

I head into the bathroom, making sure to close the door softly behind me. Then I lock the door and start allowing myself to freak the fuck out.

_What did he mean?! I mean, I KNOW what he meant but did he REALLY mean it?!_

If he didn't then he's a piece of garbage. You don't just toss around words like that to a girl, especially not one that you live with. If he did mean it, does he… what does he want me to do about it? 'I love you', so there. Gauntlet thrown and response expected.

That is, of course, contingent on if he remembers admitting he loves me, and there's a distinct possibility he does not. If he doesn't, that's fine and we never have to think about this ever again.

_What if he does remember, but was just really, really drunk and didn't mean it in the way you think he did?_

I pause at this.

I mean… I mean I know Shinji likes me. I know he likes me a lot. Not a lot of people would have been able to deal with me for the years he has, and he hasn't run away yet.

Do I…

… _do I love him?_

I let the thought twirl around in my brain. After a moment, I turn on the shower and let the water wash away my doubts and insecurities and the thought that regardless of whether he meant it or not, he's the first person that's ever said those words to me in my entire life.

* * *

I'm standing in my father's study, and by the time he enters the room, I've figured out the words I need to say.

"Asuka," is his only introduction. I turn and I smile at him as best as I can and feel all my imagined conversations slip through my fingers and into the abyss of the forgotten.

I straighten my dress and I bow. "Father." He crosses the room, and for a moment I think he's going to hug me. I'm ashamed to say I feel my heart flutter a little at the prospect.

His hands clap on my shoulders twice, and he nods proudly.

"You've grown up!" he says, "You… goodness you look so much like your mother now."

I smile again, though I feel like screaming inside. _What was I supposed to say, again? There was something I wanted to talk to him about…_

"Thanks, dad, you look…"

_Old._ Very old now. Wasn't he taller?

"…you look good too," I finish. He takes a seat at his desk and invites me to sit opposite him, which I do.

A fire crackles in the hearth, and I wonder about the prudence of putting so many books near an open flame.

My father spreads his hands, "Well."

He looks around his table as if his business papers will somehow be inspiration for a subject, and then he removes a decanter of brandy.

"Would you like a drink?"

I feel like I'm in a job interview.

"No, thank you," I say.

"Oh come now, Asuka. Just for old time's sake." He pours two glasses without waiting for my acquiescence. I take the glass and let it feel heavy in my hands.

_Old time's sake?_ I fight back a scoff. _Yeah, because we used to drink together_ _ **all the time**_ _when I was eleven…_

"Was the flight nice?" he asks.

"It was… it was fine I guess."

"KLM?"

"Yeah."

"They're a good airline."

"Yeah, I uh… yeah, sure."

He nods, taking this non-information in as if I were telling him something important. He clears his throat.

"I understand your friend is here, too."

"Boyfriend," I correct him.

"Oh?" For the first time in the conversation he looks vaguely interested, but it's not a look of paternal concern, simply an acknowledgement that yes, there are indeed things he doesn't know. "How long have you two been seeing each other?"

"Almost two years now."

"And you just turned twenty-three?"

My brow furrows. I feel my fake smile slipping, but I manage a curt nod.

_I'm your daughter..._

"Twenty-three… good age. Are you two thinking about marriage?"

"Uh… no, I mean we haven't… no."

"Ah. It's not serious then?"

"No I mean… yes it _is_ serious, it's just that," I brush my hair back behind my ear, "you know, I don't want to ruin things by moving too fast. That'll happen if it happens."

"Mm. It's tough to know when you're ready for it."

The one of his voice doesn't invite discussion into _that_ subject. A message blips on his computer, and I can feel his eyes drifting towards the desktop. He's trying to surreptitiously read the subject line.

I'm certain I'm not smiling anymore.

_I'm your_ _**daughter.** _

"So," he says, turning to type a response, "I'd love to meet him. Maybe you, Shinichi and I-"

"Shinji."

"Right, maybe we could all meet for dinner sometime this week? I could have Hans arrange everything. Oh, did you meet Hans? He's our butl-"

"Was there a single day in your entire god damn life that you loved me?" I ask.

His fingers pause above the keys. My face feels hot with embarrassment and impotent rage.

_Fuck this._

I stand, and I knock the brandy off of the desk. I get a sick sort of satisfaction from hearing it clatter against the wooden floor.

"You're my _father!_ I haven't seen you in ten years, and we're-" I shake my head incredulously. "What are we even talking about here?! This is just polite nice-to-meet-you _bullshit!_ You haven't been listening to single word I've been saying!"

His face is stony, but at least he's looking at me now.

"You want to know about my life, huh?! Why, so you have some interesting trivia to tell your pals over drinks?! 'My darling daughter this' and 'my beautiful girl that'. You don't mean _any_ of it! You don't care! If you _cared_ it wouldn't have taken us ten fucking years to have this conversation!"

"Asuka, that's quite eno-"

"You want some interesting things about my life? Okay, let's start!" I crack my knuckles, and begin to count on my fingers. "I smoke a pack of cigarettes a day and have since I got to college. Yes. I know. I hear it's really ' _bad for you'._ I have a severe drinking problem, and I think borderline alcoholism, but I'm working on it, which _sucks_ but that's life, right? This all points to me just having an addictive streak in my personality in general, and what I would consider more than a small inclination towards self-sabotage, but that's not much of a shock considering that you and mom sent me – when I was a _child –_ to go _die in a fucking robot!"_

He opens his mouth but I bowl him over. I can't stop now – I've found my words again, and they taste triumphant in my mouth.

"I've tried to kill myself before, once very seriously, but the only person – and I really mean this, dad, the _ONLY_ person – who noticed or cared is the man who is now my boyfriend! Maybe I will marry him? I don't fucking know! I'm twenty-three! It's a bit soon to god damn ask, but I _will_ say this: he took my virginity, he has my whole heart in the palm of his hand and he's too good of a person to realize what that could mean! He's the most important thing that's ever happened to me in my entire lifetime, and you don't even have the decency to remember his _GOD DAMN NAME!"_

I take a step back. My chest is heaving like I just ran a marathon. I point to this cruel, stupid old man.

I make my voice as even and rational as I humanly can:

"What _is_ his name, dad? If you tell me what his name is right now, I will apologize, and I will play the good daughter, and I'll see you at whatever time Hans decides we eat." I stare into his eyes. "So what is it?"

There's a part of me that hopes he'll just say 'Shinji' and that for once in our lives we can be a family the way we're supposed to be – the way we never were with my real mama or the woman he married after her.

Maybe…

Maybe 'love' is the family we choose for ourselves? Maybe that's what the word really means: 'I am _choosing_ you.' It means that this person – this _specific_ person - has more value to you than most other people in the entire world. It means you ache in their absence, and that you will do anything to ensure they stay by you, because they make your life _better_. They make _you_ better. They fix you the way everyone deserves to be fixed. Family doesn't always do that for you; the people you love do.

I feel nothing for this heartless old stranger in front of me.

And I never will.

After what seems like an eternity, my father opens his mouth, "Well, I see the tantrums haven't changed very much."

I let my hand drop to my side, and I nod.

I'm not even angry anymore. I don't care enough anymore.

I turn for the door without so much as a goodbye.

I march to my room, and I open the door to see Shinji sitting up in the bed. He's dressing. It's past noon, but he's just getting up now, the worst of the hangover well passed.

"Is everything okay?" He looks concerned as he pulls his shirt on over his head. "I heard you guys shouting, bu-"

"Hey Shinji," I say.

"Yeah?"

"I love you, too."

* * *


	8. Chapter 8

"This winter hasn't been so rough  
Oh it was cold, but it wasn't cold enough  
To freeze the blood beneath our spines  
And at least I survived."  
\- pup

* * *

My brain has stopped working. I might still be drunk. I certainly still feel it at the edges of my temples when I move, but no amount of inebriation could have prepared me for this.

"…what?"

Asuka stands in the doorway of a bedroom I have no memory returning to. I think she's angry, but her voice is even and calm, like someone in shock. If she _is_ angry, I have no idea what she's angry about. Then again, that's honestly kind of my default state with Asuka, anyway.

Her hand grips tighter on the doorway.

"You heard me," she says. "'I love you.' I do."

Uh...

Yeah, I think I'm still drunk. I'm drunk or this is some sort of very odd, very wish-fulfilling dream. I feel my face start to heat up.

"A-Asuka, I-"

"I want to get out of here. I never want to come back," she continues. "Nothing here matters anymore. This is just the past." She draws a deep breath. "Here's what's gonna happen: I'm going to go onto the balcony, and I'm going to smoke my last cigarette. Then I'm going to come back in here, we'll pack, and we'll get on a train." She wets her lips and continues, paying no attention to the desperate look of confusion on my face. "We'll see Europe, we'll swim in the Atlantic, we'll do whatever the fuck we want and no one will tell us 'no', and do you know why all of this going to happen?"

I truly have no idea.

"It will happen because I love you." For the first time since she began talking, she smiles. A moment later a giggle slips out of her mouth. She looks… unburdened. She looks like she was in chains and is at long last finally free.

And she is overwhelmingly beautiful.

I finally find my voice, and ask the only question that seems relevant anymore.

"Asuka, is… is everything okay?"

She nods curtly. "I'll see you in ten minutes."

With a turn, she walks out of the room.

And everything she had said came true.

* * *

No one in the party is speaking, but Asuka especially seems frozen in shock. She might as well have been hewn from stone, stuck forever in a half-turn, surprise permanently etched into her blue and red.

My hands are shaking, and as far as I can tell they're the only things moving in the room. The ring box between them trembling slightly in the air and getting heavier by the second. How long has it been already? I feel like I could have lived and died and lived again in the time it's taken her to process what is happening.

Is this a good sign? At least now I know that she certainly didn't see this coming, but my girlfriend isn't always a huge fan of surprises. After five years of living as a couple, you'd think that I would have more of a grasp of how her brain works.

The shock slowly leaves her face, and is replaced with a terrifying blankness. The champagne glass in her hand, which she'd been holding at conversational chest-level, drifts slowly to her hip.

She's appraising me, looking at me in the way only she can – the way that seems to ask a million questions yet invites none in return. I know that this is her 'serious consideration' face, and I know she only brings it out when the gears in her head are working in overdrive.

What... what do I do if she says no? Certainly I've ruined everything then. I really don't know if I could go back to sleeping next to someone who told the world 'you're not good enough'. I mean, I know I'd do it. What other choice would I have?

I couldn't imagine a future without her; I couldn't imagine an endless expanse of time without her asleep to my left. I... I don't even remember what I _did_ when I was single. How did I fill the days? Who did I talk about everything with? Where was the warmth that let me sleep at night?

Can loneliness kill someone? Can someone actually _die_ of a broken heart? I never want to know, but I've thought about this long enough now to be sure that this is what I want. If she doesn't want it too, then I'll have to...

I'll have to accept that somehow.

Gauntlet thrown, response expected. My future is in her hands now.

Asuka's face is still serene; she's still thinking.

After an eternity, she gives me a small, secret smile.

Which is immediately supplanted by her trademark scowl.

"Okay, but for real though," she turns, addressing the crowd, "where is that Kansai-speaking sonofabitch?"

" _What?!"_ Touji's yell is deafening in the quiet room. He pushes his way forward from behind me, and stands at my shoulder.

For my part, I remain on my one knee. Touji points at me.

"Do you know how long I had to talk this sad bastard into this?! He's jus' been whinin' and _whining_ for months!" Touji runs a hand through his hair in exasperation. "Ring shopping, Sohryu. He took me _ring shopping_."

Asuka cocks a hip, and places her fist on it, "Aw, well that's really cute that you guys went on a date, but all I really want to know is if doing it at this party was your idea or his, because honestly?" She points around at the hanging chandeliers, festooned with New Years decorations. "…honestly this is tacky as hell."

I am literally dripping with sweat now. The ring is still hanging between us, and is so uncomfortable to hold that it feels like it's literally aflame.

Asuka is barely even looking my way. It seems like she's forgotten about me, utterly and completely.

"T- _tacky?!"_ Touji explodes to my right. He draws the back of his arm across his mouth. "Okay, you want to know the truth? _Yeah_ , the party was my idea, because I thought 'Hey, if my buddy Shinji's gonna be stuck wit' _you_ forever, then we might as well all get drunk before we watch him _ruin his life forever!_ "

"Pfffft."

"It's romantic!"

" _PFFFFFFT."_

"Oh wow, that's super mature, Sohryu. What are we doing here?" Touji grabs my arm and hauls me to my feet. "Come on, bud, this shit ain't worth your-"

"She didn't answer," I say, finally finding my voice. The party is silent again, Asuka seems to finally remember I'm there. I shake out of Touji's grasp and step towards my girlfriend. I remove the ring and hold it to her. "I… don't care if the answer is no. I hope to god it isn't, but I _need_ you to tell me."

I clear my throat and for the second time that night, I ask: "Asuka, will you marry me?"

She blinks.

"Huh? Oh, I mean, yeah, of course." My heart stops. She tucks her hair behind her ear, her face starting to turn the same color as her hair. "W-wait, that wasn't obvious?"

"Ya had _me_ fooled," Touji grumbles somewhere behind me. He doesn't matter anymore. All that matters is that this is literally the moment all my dreams are coming true.

Her face is completely red now. "What?!" Turning away, she buries it in her hands. "I gave you the look, though!"

"The look?"

"Yeah! The look!" She turns, her finger pointing at me reproachfully. "It's that look I give! It's the 'yes' look! You know what it means!"

"H-hold on," I stammer, "when was the-?"

The redness in Asuka's face hits a critical level. She tosses her hands in the air, pacing madly. " _Augh!_ God! You're such an… you're such an unbelievable… did you _really_ think that-?!"

She comes to a halt in front of me, and shakes her head. Wetness stings at the edge of her eyes. We might be in a room full of people, but this moment exists only between the two of us _._

"What are you _stupid?"_ She whispers. She's crying, but she's no long self-conscious enough to hide it. "Of course I want to marry you, you idiot."

I pull her into a kiss and the rooms erupts into a cheer.

* * *

"What if she hates me?"

I sigh, "She's not gonna hate you…"

There's a shrug against my side.

"You don't know that. She might." Asuka Langley Ikari yawns, and moves her hands down to her swollen stomach. "I hated _my_ mother. I dunno, maybe it's genetic or something?"

"I mean, that was different..."

Another shrug.

"Why?" I continue, smirking. "Were you thinking about restarting NERV or something? _Then_ she might hate you, but she wouldn't be the only one, let me tell you."

She gently pushes a fist into my side, then releases it. She sidles closer in the bed, nuzzling into my chest and snaking her hand down under the covers to find mine.

The room is warm, and I enjoy the feeling of the soft pillow under my head. There's silence for a long time. _Seven months now…_

Asuka didn't know how to take the pregnancy at first. We hadn't been trying for a baby, it had just… happened. It wasn't an insane thought though – we were established now, we had good jobs. It's not like we were in our twenties anymore…

But still, I had brought up the subject of 'options', simply to give her the peace of mind that if she wasn't ready, I didn't have to be, either.

_"Do you… do you not want it?" she had asked, and she'd looked fragile enough to push over and shatter. "Because I- I mean... I'm **scared** , sure, but it's not like I..." She'd shaken her head in confusion. I could see the fear battling with something else inside of her chest. _

_Finally, she'd looked back at me._

_"I mean… it's **ours** , right? I don't know if I can do that to something that's ours…"_

After that the subject hadn't been raised again. We were going to be parents, for better or for worse.

Presently, though, there are no fears our doubts or conversations. There is just my wife, this bed, and the perfection of silence. The room is dark and it's well past midnight, but by her stirring I know she's still awake. Asuka has trouble falling asleep when something's on her mind.

"…tell me I'm gonna be a good mom?" It's a statement, like her commands always are, but it sounds like a question. She only does that when she really needs the answer.

"You're going to be a great mother."

"I'm not fat now, right? I don't know, I feel fat..."

"You're not fat, Asuka. You're pregnant. That's not the same thing."

"Tell me she won't hate me?"

I chuckle, "She won't, I swear."

"How do you know though?" She pushes back and looks at me – two blue fires in the stillness around them. She needs this answer most of all.

"Well," I venture, treading carefully. "If anything feelings are _really_ genetic, it must be affectionate ones, right? She's half of me, and I certainly love you." I squeeze her hand tighter. "Even when you're being annoying and should really go to sleep. Like right now."

Asuka thinks.

And then smiles. She plants a kiss on my cheek before lying back down.

After a moment, I can't help but ask: "How do you know it's going to be a girl, by the way? Did you ask the doctor?"

"Oh," she whispers, sleep now finally taking her. "I don't. But I'm preparing for the worst."

"I wouldn't mind a girl…"

"No," my wife says, decisively. "Girls are terrible. We don't want a girl. Trust me."

* * *

By the time we stop in front of our daughter's school, she's got a grip so tight on Asuka's leg that I'm not sure she's going to let go. Hana always flocks to her mom when she's scared – she may have gotten the hair and the eyes, but she certainly has my timidity.

"Do I _have_ to go?" she asks, as the school comes into sight. Pre-school was fine, but kindergarten isn't something she thinks she's totally prepared for. I watch her shiver in the fall air.

"Yes, you do," Asuka gently removes Hana's hands from her leg, and crouches down in front of her. "I tell you all the time that you're stronger than you think, Hana. You're going to be fine," Asuka brushes a hair behind her daughter's ear. "And besides, you're _so_ smart! Come on, I'm sure the other kids are gonna be impressed. How many red-heads are gonna be in the class, you think?"

Hana stifles a proud smile and shakes her head. "None."

A triumphant kiss to the forehead. "Exactly. Do you _not_ want the other kids to know how cool you are? I would! I'd be proud to be so smart and pretty!"

Which is truer than our daughter will ever know. Asuka leans in and says something quietly in German that makes Hana laugh. I never really figured the language out, but Hana seems to have an almost preternatural gift for it.

"Fragst du Papa was ihm denken," Asuka suggests, with a sly smirk and a shrug. "Warum nicht?" After a moment of thought, Hana nods, and reaches for my hand.

I crouch down next to her.

"Were you scared when _you_ went to school, dad?"

"Yeah," I admit in total honestly. "Every first day was a little rough, but you know, soon enough you start to make friends, right?"

Hana, for her part, still looks a little unsure, but nods anyway. It's decided. She's _going_ to school.

Asuka pats her shoulders, "Now, that all being said: also remember what mommy told you, okay? If any of the other kids gives you shit, you punch them in the face."

I sigh, shaking my head. "Honey, mommy's just joking again."

"No, I'm not. If any of those kids gives you shit? You punch them. In. The…" Asuka tilts her head forward.

"…face," comes the reply. Asuka nods, beaming.

"That's my girl!"

We both embrace her, and I hear my wife whisper in her ear how much she loves her. Asuka always tries to do it somewhat clandestinely, in some struggling final bit of pride, but it's always obvious to everyone around.

It was the first thing she said to her, in fact.

_Asuka was beside herself. Her hair was plastered to her forehead from sweat, her face a mixture of relief and unfathomable fatigue. All of her fears and doubts and misgivings had disappeared sometime during labor, never to be seen again._

_The first time she held Hana, she broke down into tears._

_"How do I hold her? Am I holding her right?!" she implored the doctors. "I don't want to hurt her. Please don't let me hurt her, if I start doing something wrong, you **tell** me, okay?!" _

_They assured her everything was fine, and then it was just us and the child. Our child. 'Hana'._

_"She'll always know that she's loved - she's safe," Asuka whispered, promising the world. She re-positioned Hana in her arms, "Shinji, she'll always know I love her. That's all I want..."_

Children, apparently, can learn from their parent's mistakes.

Hana gives us both a kiss on the side of the face, and shoulders her backpack before heading into the courtyard. As if on cue, another six-year-old lets out a yell of excitement and runs over to her. Hana's face lights up and quickly they begin talking.

"You know, you really shouldn't curse in front of her," I mumble.

"Oh come on! The kids last year were great, but what if these are just a bunch of little demon children? I don't want her to get eaten alive in there!" Asuka leans her head against my shoulder. "Besides, she's an Ikari through and through. I don't think she has it in her to punch a kid. Not yet."

"Yet?"

"Well, I mean, we've got time." Asuka looks up at me, smiling devilishly, and I can't help but lean down and kiss her. She puts her hand to the side of my face, and we look back at Hana and her friend, disappearing into the sea of children.

A lifetime ago, Asuka posited that this moment could never happen because eventually everything ends, but I don't think that's true.

I think the answer is that a door you don't open is a door that's shut forever.

I think the answer is that nothing ends, and everything continues on. It twists and turns and spirals out until we are all together, for a while, forever.

"Do you think she's going to be okay?"

"Honestly, I wouldn't worry too much about it."

THE END

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Be kind to each other.


End file.
